Ja,nyiah Knight was making a “spectacle” of herself Tuesday at the Cummer Museum of Art and Gardens.

To match the wire glasses she made at the Jacksonville museum on Riverside Avenue, the West Riverside Elementary School student twisted more colored wire into a bracelet with Very Special Arts volunteer Jennifer Snyder.

The 9-year-old girl, one of about 2,400 exceptional education students joining teachers and parents at this week’s 18th annual Very Special Arts Festival, said this art is fun.

“We get to see cool things, like right now I am here making art,” she said.

Beauclerc Elementary School teacher Patricia Howell has been bringing her kindergarten-through-second-grade exceptional education students to Very Special Arts for years. She prepares them with art projects from the Cummer’s online education resources, and they get excited.

“It gives them an opportunity to express themselves more openly and not be so confined,” she said. “It is not so structured.”

The first Very Special Arts had 225 Duval County students and 40 volunteers. Now about 1,400 volunteers from area companies, colleges, schools and the museum will do art projects with pre-kindergarten through middle school students from Duval and three area counties through Friday.

The students toured eight ArtStops, all adapted so children with physical disabilities can participate. Wire sculptures were made outside on tables flanking a bronze statue in the upper lawn. Other students molded clay in a studio, while collages were done in another gallery. In another studio, University of North Florida student volunteers Susan Cebulski and Alan Crouch helped Sheffield Elementary School students Montrelle Prince and Nathan Meddler paint landscapes.

“It’s good,” said Montrelle, 8. “I like this place.”

Five-year-old Charles E. Bennett Elementary School student Angelinimar Feliciano waved an electronic paint brush in the air, and her modern art was projected onto a big screen at an Art Connections station, helped by retired teacher Peggy Isgette.

“It is one of my highlights of the year and I love it,” the volunteer said. “The joy that they feel and the interaction is wonderful. As a retired teacher, I certainly appreciate this.”

As she watched students, some in wheelchairs, flood museum galleries to paint, sculpt clay and interact with musicians, museum director Hope McMath said this event is so popular that there are 1,500 students on a waiting list. It is also the staff’s favorite week because it creates excitement as well as education.

“Museums, though they are filled with art, tend to have this preciousness about them — almost chapel-like,” McMath said. “For me, this is what museums should be, where the art becomes something living, breathing, dynamic and relevant.”